Sunday, September 5, 2010
7:30 PM
Admission: $5.00
Movies on a Big Screen at The Guild
2828 35th St, Sacramento, CA
Salt of the Earth (1954)
"Salt of the Earth" portrays the story of the Empire Zinc Mine strike in 1951. Directed by Herbert Biberman ("Meet Nero Wolfe"), Produced by Paul Jarrico ("Tom, Dick and Harry") and written by Michael Wilson "Lawrence of Arabia," "Planet of the Apes") the film employed a handful of professional actors, but mostly utilized mine workers and their families who were involved in the actual strike.
In New Mexico (where the strike originally took place) a largely Hispanic union is trying to achieve wage parity and improve working and living conditions for the laborers who live in poverty. This results in a strike by the men, yet the men are ultimately beaten and broken. Interestingly, the women fight for the right to carry on the strike (and do so), resulting in a film that not only made bold statements about labor relations for the time, but also was one of the first films to portray a feminist social and political viewpoint.
During filming, threats of vigilante violence against the production were common. The US House of Representatives denounced the film, the FBI investigated its production, and The American Legion called for a nationwide boycott of it. Post-production facilities were told not to work on it (creating a massive delay and headache in finishing it and forced the film to be edited in secret locations), and theaters and projectionists were instructed not to screen it. When initially released, only a dozen theaters in the US would run it. Through the 1960s and beyond, "Salt of the Earth" gained a following via college campuses, labor activists, Mexican Americans, film historians and professors, First Amendment advocates, and feminists.
"H'wood Reds are shooting a feature-length anti-American racial propaganda movie at Silver City..." - Hollywood Reporter, ca. 1953
"Completely un-American propaganda." - Screen Actors Guild statement on "Salt of the Earth," 1953.
"As clear a piece of Communist propaganda as we have had for many years... extremely shrewd propaganda for the urgent business of the U.S.S.R." - Pauline Kael, Sight & Sound. 1954
"A good, highly dramatic and emotion-charged piece of work that tells its story straight. It is, however, a propaganda picture which belongs in union halls rather than theatres." - Variety, Dec 31, 1953
"In the light of this agitated history, it is somewhat surprising to find that 'Salt of the Earth' is, in substance, simply a strong pro-labor film with a particularly sympathetic interest in the Mexican-Americans with whom it deals.." - New York Times, 1954
Sunday, September 12, 2010
7:30 PM
Admission: $5.00
Movies on a Big Screen at The Guild
2828 35th St, Sacramento, CA
Crime Wave
It's our 4th year anniversary, so we're going back into our archive to show one of MOBS' personal favorites!
From "Kids in the Hall" director John Paizs comes a surreal comedic obscurity from 1985. There's no true way to try to convey this film in words, but the general plot centers on a quiet young man (also played by Paizs) who is intent on writing "the greatest color crime movie ever made," but can only write beginnings and endings - and those only by streetlight. After befriending the young Kim, she tries to help him complete his opus, but fails. Throughout the film, the various beginnings, endings, and rejected "middles" are dramatized. Throw in a mysterious and psychotic script doctor named Dr. Jolly, a private club for imaginary friends, a quarantined city -- and you still won't come close to the idea of what this film is really like.
"Genuinely unique--every time you think you know where it's going, it veers off in some strange, and strangely fascinating, direction." - Baltimore City Paper
Sunday, September 19, 2010
7:30 PM
Admission: $5.00
Movies on a Big Screen at The Guild
2828 35th St, Sacramento, CA
Brutal Beauty: Tales of the Rose City Rollers
With members of Sacramento's Sacred City Derby Girls in attendance! Plus, director Chip Mabry is currently scheduled to be in attendance!
A harrowing and fun tale of girls fighting for the best of themselves, "Brutal Beauty" tells the story of Portland's Roller Derby queens, the Rose City Rollers. The Rollers tell how derby saved their souls - and kicked their ass.
"Forget Drew Barrymore's recent foray into rollerderby: Chip Mabry's Brutal Beauty gives an honest shot of girl-powered adrenaline in his documentary on Portland's own Rose City Rollers." - Willamette Week
"Brutal Beauty contextualizes the sport of roller derby and explores how participating in a full-contact sport can challenge our notions of traditional femininity." - Bitch Magazine
Please note: this screening is in advance of The WFTA Western Regional Derby Tournament, hosted by Sacred City Derby Girls, at Memorial Auditorium Oct 1 - Oct 3!! More info here at Rollin' on the River.
Sunday, September 26, 2010
7:00 PM
Admission: $6.00
Movies on a Big Screen at The Guild
2828 35th St, Sacramento, CA
Lunch Line
In conjunction with Slow Food Sacramento. A portion of the admission will benefit Time For Lunch, "a campaign to give kids the school food they deserve."
Community activists for real food in schools will be in attendance to speak following the film.
"Lunch Line" reframes the school lunch debate through an examination of the program's surprising past, uncertain present, and possible future.
In the film, six kids from one of the toughest neighborhoods in Chicago set out to fix school lunch and end up at the White House. Their unlikely journey parallels the dramatic transformation of school lunch from a weak patchwork of local anti-hunger efforts to a robust national feeding program. The film tracks key moments in school food and child nutrition from 1940s, 1960s, and 1980s to the present - revealing political twists, surprising alliances, and more common ground than people realize.
Along the way, Senators, Secretaries of Agriculture, entrepreneurs, and activists from across the political spectrum add top-down perspective to a bottom-up film about the American political process, the health and welfare of its future, and the realities of feeding more than 31 million children a day.
About Slow Food Sacramento: Slow Food Sacramento is the local chapter of Slow Food, an international organization, founded in Italy 1986, whose aim is to protect the pleasures of the table from the homogenization of modern fast food and life. Through a variety of initiatives it promotes gastronomic culture, develops taste education, conserves agricultural biodiversity and protects traditional foods at risk of extinction. The Sacramento chapter hosts a wide range of educational and convivial events throughout the year to introduce you to the producers and creators of some of the region's outstanding foods, farms, and restaurants.
